WOMAN: Bill, no! MAN GRUNTS, WOMAN SHRIEKS the war next door ` Oh my God. WOMAN YELLS INDISTINCTLY 31 gunshots,... He came right up to us and said, 'Are you ready to die?' ...two men dead and another badly wounded. I figured he was gonna come and kill all of us. Did the neighbouring family make vicious threats? The words that are coming out of my mouth, they're not gonna kill somebody. And how did it end up as a shooting spree? You had been such good neighbours. How in the world did it go so badly? GUNSHOTS Copyright Able 2015 Kia ora. I'm Sonya Wilson. They were tight-knit neighbours and friends who ended up at war. It was a vicious neighbourhood feud between three suburban homes on Smith Dr, but no one could've predicted how out of control the animosity would get and that it would end up with two men dead and another badly wounded. The question is whether the killer can get away with it ` can he claim his shooting spree was legally justified? The trouble begins here at Billy and Barbara Woodward's house. Parents of two kids, she works in HR; he's at home on disability. A Gulf War vet, he says he suffers from PTSD and anxiety, treated with a shoebox full of prescriptions. Across the street, Billy's good friend Gary Hembree lives with his girlfriend, Kim Sillsbury and their children. What was the relationship like between you two and the Woodwards? I get the impression that there was a good relationship. Gary knew them for years and years. Our kids would go on hayrides with him. It seemed fine. They were so close, Woodward even loaned Gary money. Gary's house was bursting at the seams. An old friend, Roger Picior, and his girlfriend had moved in with her children. The crowd from Gary's home often spilled next door into the yard of welder Tim Blake and his wife, Keri,... I thought it was a nice place. I mean, all the neighbours seemed really nice. Um, you know, it was very quiet, quaint. Kids were playing all the time. ...a tight group of neighbours all getting along. They even bond over chickens. Billy decides to raise some in his yard ` not exactly legal, but no one seems to mind. He considers them therapy animals. They were like pets. You could pick them up and handle them. They were very friendly. How many would you guess he had? I don't know. About 20 or so. Oh. Life was mostly fine until an incident with a birthday present. Billy and Barbara's daughter Ava was turning 12. Somebody left a present for Ava. They thought we were not home. Well, I guess we didn't hear the door, whatever, so they left it on the porch. But Ava's birthday gift went missing. The Woodwards accused the daughter of their neighbour Gary with stealing it. I just knew. I just knew that she had taken it. Gary immediately got very agitated and upset that we were accusing his daughter of having stolen something from our house. Billy and Barbara call the police. Gary's daughter's in tears. It was a bad scene. The families in those three houses along Smith Dr now at battle stations. It's Billy and Barbara Woodward versus everybody else ` Gary and Kim, Roger and the Blakes next door. Photos from that day show Billy, the man who loved those chickens, flipping the bird, and although he denies it, the neighbours say Billy also brandished a weapon. Billy lifted his shirt up and showed us his gun. When Billy's dad comes over, he says the neighbours turn on him too. Some of the comments were, 'I got me a baseball bat. I'll bash that old man's head in.' Did you fear that this could turn violent? Oh, yes, ma'am, absolutely. Yup. Hey, Pop. Things get so heated, Billy's father buys him a surveillance camera that will later record terrifying events. The neighbours across the street from Billy Woodward know exactly how to ruffle his feathers ` (CLUCKS) those precious, illegal chickens. They blow the whistle, and Billy's forced to give up his feathered friends. He and wife Barbara find them new homes in the country. How upsetting was it to Bill to have to get rid of them? It made him angry. He was just upset that there had not been a problem and then now, all of a sudden, there is. They would drive up and down the street and lay on the horn just to be irritating, so it was a constant barrage of noise, which would` they knew would bother him because of his PTSD. So it was a hostile environment? It was constant. It was constant. MAN: (SPEAKS INDISTINCTLY) ...first, and your daddy's <BLEEP>ed. Even neighbour Tim Blake admits the taunting sometimes went too far. <BLEEP>! WOMAN SHOUTS Did you ever think at some point that this is going to escalate, this is going to get bad? Uh, we even told the cops, 'Are you gonna wait till the body bags are being tidied up?' But you also knew that you were antagonising him as much as he was antagonising you. Oh, it was a 50/50 deal. Yeah, I look back now like, 'You were an idiot.' Police were soon barraged with calls from the neighbourhood, often several times a day. What would happen once the police arrived? They would say, 'Everybody needs to go home and calm down,' and` and that never happened. As soon as the police would leave, they would start their taunts again. By late August the nasty dispute ends up at the Titusville Courthouse, with all sides asking for orders of protection. After speaking out of turn in court, Billy gives his standard excuse. BILLY: Judge, I apologise for my outburst. I'm a... ...who's... and combat stress, and I don't control my actions very well. The judge denies the orders, telling them all to go home and behave, but the hotheaded neighbours can't even get out of the parking lot without a physical brawl. Billy jumps Gary,... He came right up to us and said, 'Are you ready to die?' picked Gary up by his neck, threw him up against the car. Bill, no! GRUNTING, WOMAN YELLS ...Gary's cell phone rolling on the whole thing. Hey! Stop! Hey! (GRUNTS) The <BLEEP> is wrong with you, you psychopath?! I'm OK. WOMAN CRIES The recording ends when a deputy picks up Gary's phone. Billy is arrested and released. Five days later there he is on the surveillance camera with his gun, all that ammo and his neighbours in his sights. The next time we see him on that surveillance camera, Billy's across the street, approaching Roger and his son, who had been wrestling on the lawn. BILLY: Roger's son jumped off his back when he saw me, and I shot Roger in the torso. Uh, you'll have to listen to the video to count the amount of times. TWO GUNSHOTS Right now I couldn't tell you. OK. He slumped to the ground. Billy now turns his gun on Tim Blake, standing in his carport. I followed him to his garage. He tried to go inside the door. I put rounds into his torso until he slumped to the ground. GUNSHOTS He shoots me about, I don't know, five or six times. Did he say anything? No. He was smiling. Smiling. Smiling. As these crime-scene photos show, investigators later find spit bullets and brass shell casings littering the driveway, lead-punched holes in a toolbox and the doorway, but most of Billy's shots find their target ` 11 bullets hit Tim Blake. I got a steel bullet in my backbone, one in my leg. And what's` what's racing through your mind at this point? I was` Go ahead and say my prayers. Stuff was flying around my face. I just kept getting shot everywhere, and then I was like, 'Damn, I'm already dead. I just ain't had time to die yet.' I opened the door and saw you laying in a pool blood, didn't know if you dead or alive, and closed it and called 911. Keri, did you think you were going to be killed? I did. I truly did. I thought he was gonna come in the house and shoot all of us. Then a deathly silence. But Billy isn't retreating; he's reloading a fresh clip with 15 more rounds, and now Billy's ex-friend, Gary Hembree, father of the little girl in the birthday-present spat, follows his girlfriend, Kim, out their front door, straight into the line of fire. Gary Hembree come out of his garage and said, 'What the hell's going on out here?' Mm. And I had a clean shot at his chest, and I put one dead centre of his chest. He slumped to the ground. Trapped under her bullet-riddled car next her wounded boyfriend, Kim sees Woodward closing in. He came back, and I watched his feet walk up very slowly, and he emptied the rest of the clip out on my boyfriend. GUNSHOTS Tim Blake is alive today for one reason. Cos I was out of bullets. OK. So you ran out. Mm. I used... 31 rounds ` two 15-round clips and one in the chamber. Then you ran dry? Ran dry. OK. On three people. Ran dry, as if he's been watering the lawn instead of mowing down his neighbours. Billy walks back to his home as another neighbour calls out, 'You all right?' Billy's answer? Like ice. I got 'em all! I got 'em all! 'I got 'em all,' he says. Minutes later, that camera still recording as Smith Dr lights up with first responders. Tonight ` a Titusville man shot 11 times by his neighbour. Billy's wife, Barbara, says she slept through the whole thing, and when she wakes up, she believes her husband is a victim. You thought your husband` I thought my husband was dead. Did you know that he was capable of that kind of violence? The man that I know and I believe in would not just go shoot some people because he was angry. (SNIFFS) Something had to happen. Days later Tim Blake comes to in a hospital. Detectives arrive to break the bad news about his two other neighbours. DETECTIVE: I` I can tell you that... They didn't make it, OK? After the shooting, in a police interview room, Billy Woodward waves away his Miranda rights and starts talking. He seems to lose his head for a moment. And these people... (INHALES) <BLEEP>ed with me and <BLEEP>ed with me and <BLEEP>ed with me and <BLEEP>ed with me and <BLEEP>ed with me and... Listen. Do you feel like you should go to jail for this? No, because I have pleaded, I have begged and I have asked for help. No. I don't deserve to go to jail for this. Those sorry <BLEEP>ers deserve to go to jail for what they did to me and my family for the last month, making us live like prisoners in our own home. Mm. Well, yeah. I'm a soldier; I fought the war, I fought to win, and I won. When we come back ` Billy Woodward now looking more like a salesman than a soldier. But he's still fighting ` fighting to find a way out of jail. And how about that look on his face in that mugshot? What does he know that we don't? Is there something on that surveillance tape that could set him free? War had been declared upon my house and family. Do you not understand that, sir? Stay with us. INTRIGUING MUSIC Two guys, they were looking at my soap and laughing. My soap is not funny at all. Sometimes these guys have a trouble My name is Naresh, and I am owner of this shop ` me and my brother. Lots of people are coming when they are stoned. Always I can tell that. Two guys, they were looking at my soap and laughing. My soap is not funny at all. Sometimes these guys have a trouble to` you know, with the EFTPOS machine. My machine is fine. Maybe you are a bit slow today, mate. If you can't use the EFTPOS machine, how can you drive the car? 1 The feuding neighbours on Smith Dr in Titusville, Florida, complained they couldn't get anyone's attention ` Surveillance video shows... well, they got it now. ...neighbourhood shoot-out. Crawling around... You shoot up the neighbourhood, and people notice. Police say after he fired on all three victims, he went back to two of them, looked down at them and shot them again in the head. And before the crime tape comes down, people are arguing about whether Billy Woodward did the right thing. You should be ashamed of yourself. And you should be ashamed of yourself. Have you ever cursed a person yourself? Do you deserve to get shot execution-style? ...right over there earlier. Do you deserve to get shot? Two years after the killings the argument moves from the street to a more formal setting ` the courthouse in Viera, Florida. And look at Billy Woodward now in a suit and tie, a far cry from the distraught man with his head in his hands in that police interrogation room, charged with murder and attempted murder. But in an audacious legal manoeuvre, Woodward and his defence team turn the tables on the state's attorney, claiming Woodward is immune from prosecution under Florida's stand-your-ground law. How does 'stand your ground' work exactly? In a stand-your-ground state, I don't have to retreat; I can stand my ground, I can stay right there and respond to your deadly force with my own deadly force. In this courtroom, a special stand-your-room immunity hearing ` no jury; just a judge. Billy and his attorneys must prove that in the same circumstances, a reasonable person, like you or me, would have done what he did. We have to prove that his fear was reasonable. Gary Hembree's girlfriend, Kim Sillsbury, is named as one of the ringleaders in harassing the Woodwards, but she denies some of the allegations. Did you threaten to burn down his house? No. Did you threaten to do anything to them? N` Not that I remember, no. Did you ever threaten to get somebody to rape his daughter? That's ridiculous. I have children. I had never gone out of my way to be violent to that man, and anything that I did say or could have said or may have said that I remember or don't remember never would've hurt anybody's child ever. Billy Woodward says that you all threatened him. The words that are coming out of my mouth, they're not gonna kill somebody. What do you say to someone who might say that you all sort of provoked some kind of violence here? Nobody has the right to take someone else's life. Nobody has that right. You might think Billy Woodward, the man who shot his neighbours, would be a pariah, an outcast, but his wife, Barbara, says it's quite the opposite. Families of the victim see your husband as a villain. How do you see your husband? He's not a villain. (INHALES) He saved my life, and so some people would call that heroic. A hero? In the Woodward's old neighbourhood on Smith Dr in Titusville, Florida, plenty of people seem to agree. There are literal signs of support. They all ganged up on Billy and his wife and his family. Scott and Lydia Crow, who lived behind Billy and Barbara Woodward, had a front-row seat to the feud. They're taking Woodward's side. Was it kind of bullying? BOTH: Yes. It was adult bullying, is exactly what it was. And any time he would call the police department, it was six people's word against his. They say they were even drawn into the conflict when Keri Blake threatened them and other neighbours. And Keri took her finger, pointed at our house and pointed at Billy's house like, 'We're gonna get you, and we're gonna get you, and we're gonna get you.' Sir, come on up here and take the witness stand. Back at the courthouse, Woodward's defending himself during a stand-your-ground hearing. Do you swear, affirm, the testimony you give in this case is the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help you God? Yes, sir. If they can pull off this legal manoeuvre, he can avoid a trial and be set free. They were becoming more hostile, and the threats were becoming more real. His lawyers try to prove that during weeks of taunts and threats, Woodward showed restraint. < There were periods of time when you were actually angry and enraged, is that correct? Yes, sir. < Did you get a gun, walk across the street and shoot somebody? No, sir. Right after the shootings, Billy Woodward never mentioned weapons or an imminent threat, but now, with everything on the line, his story of what happened the night of the shooting has critical new details, his lawyers producing this Facebook photo of neighbour Roger Picior, one of the men Billy killed, holding a rifle. They cue up that surveillance video. At about 10.22, you hear sounds of that rowdy barbecue across the street. PEOPLE CHATTER At 10.41, here are the neighbours taunting and cursing at Billy. MAN: Queer-ass porky reject bitch. At 10.54, Billy says he hears shots. And I distinctly heard from my house, with my window cracked, four cracks of a 22 automatic firearm, and I heard 'bang, bang, bang!' BANGING Listen again. Sound like gunfire to you or just firecrackers? BANGING That is a 22-automatic. At 11.05, Billy says the neighbours are talking about a gun. WOMAN: Be careful. (SPEAKS INDISTINCTLY) The girl said, 'They've got a gun. 'Oh my God,' to that effect, 'They've got a gun.' Then at 12.02 just after midnight, Billy says he sees his neighbour set something on fire, and that's when he gets his gun. < Now, what about that caused you to arm yourself? Because I didn't know if that was a Molotov cocktail, if it was gonna come through and into my house. CLICKING If I'm inside my house, I'm trapped like a rat. GUN COCKS Outside now with his gun and extra ammo, the former soldier says he hears the men planning to come get him. It's a gathering of the forces that caused me to snap into action and do what I did. Is that where you were in that point in time? Were you in war? You doggone right I was. War had been declared upon my house and family and myself. But despite his supposed fears for his life and his family's safety, things do not go well for Woodward in the courtroom. That's after the break. A judge rejected a Titusville veteran's claim that he shot his neighbours in self-defence. He called William Woodward the aggressor in this case. This defendant did not exercise self-defence. This defendant did not stand his ground. And that means William Woodward now faces trial for murder and attempted murder. GUNSHOTS GENTLE PIANO MUSIC GENTLE MUSIC CONTINUES Life's better together. UPBEAT MUSIC Join Vodafone on a monthly plan, and if you don't love our network within 30 days, we'll give you your money back. That's our network guarantee. Welcome back. Billy Woodward's shooting rampage rattled the neighbourhood and left two men dead, but the survivors deny there was any real threat to Woodward on that night. In fact, police say none of the victims were armed, something Woodward acknowledges in his first recorded interview with police at the scene. But at the hearing, Woodward now says he thought the neighbours did have weapons. He says Roger had an aluminium baseball bat in his hands. And you're gonna hear that baseball bat fall to the ground as I shoot him. His lawyers play surveillance video. GUNSHOT Listen to the sound just after the second gunshot. GUNSHOT, ENGINE HUMS, METAL CLANKS They say that's the sound of an aluminium bat hitting the pavement,... ENGINE HUMS, METAL CLANKS ...but police did not find a bat at the scene. The scene was cleaned up. The gun was gone. The bat was gone. The pipe was gone. The scene was cleaned up, and that's why everybody thinks they were unarmed. They were not unarmed. Woodward says he thought Gary Hembree was pointing a gun at him, that only after the killing did he realise what he really had in his hand ` < Did you learn at that point what was in his hand? After the fact ` a coffee mug, sir. a coffee mug. After a week of testimony, Judge James Earp must now decide whether Woodward goes to trial or goes free. In a case like this, an analysis seems to suggest that this immunity hearing was not gonna be granted, because there was no good argument that the threat was imminent that he was responding to. Just hours later Judge Earp is back on the bench ready to rule. If you'd like to get up and leave after you know what the ruling is, you're welcome to do that, of course. The only relevant concept to me... Judge James Earp returns to the bench in the Viera, Florida, courthouse ready to rule on whether Billy Woodward was some kind of neighbourhood hero standing his ground, saving his family, or whether he's just another accused killer with a grudge and a gun. Turns out Woodward's about to have another very bad day. This is an order denying his claim of immunity pursuant to Florida statute 776.032. A judge rejected a Titusville veteran's claim that he shot his neighbours in self-defence. He called William Woodward the aggressor in this case. This defendant did not exercise self-defence. This defendant did not stand his ground. And that means William Woodward now faces trial for murder and attempted murder. Woodward's lawyer, Robert Berry, hopes a jury will be more sympathetic. If we end up in trial, uh, we're gonna put on the same exact defence. Do you have a` a guess about the chances for acquittal for Billy Woodward in this case? If I were to guess, the facts are too much against him. The way he did what he did was too rational. It was too planned out. Some neighbours have feuds, some neighbours build fences, but your husband shot his dead. Could your husband have done something different? He could've waited for them to come across the street and shoot him, and then we would all be dead. That man needs to be behind bars. There is something wrong with him. He could face the death penalty. I'm OK with that. He's facing, possibly, the death penalty. Uh-huh. Should he be put to death? > Yes, I think he should. I think he should die. But Jeanie Huppert, the mom of Gary Hembree, shot with a coffee cup in his hand, doesn't want anyone else to die. No, not to death. No. I don't want his mother to go through this. I don't want his kids to ever go through this. It's not gonna bring Gary back. Nearly three years since that nightmare on Smith St, one final, heartbreaking twist. If Billy Woodward had held his fire just a few more days, his neighbourhood feud would've ended on its own ` Gary Hembree was planning to move, and the Woodwards were just days away from packing up too, ready to close on a new house. Woodward even mentions it to detectives. Had you ever thought about killing them before tonight? No. You know why? Cos we just signed on a brand-new house. We were` We were going to a new neighbourhood. Billy Woodward is now facing a murder trial, which is likely to take place later this year.